Memoirs of a Pokemon Master CHAPTER 19 On the road to Viridian City
"Hey! Think porygon can help?" - Andrew Stolf
During our three day repast we decided to take a small tour of the island, since we only had been to the burnt down lab, the pokecenter, and the gym. The island was mainly laboratories which we could not enter. One lab was open to the public. We went in and found many computers on display. In the back, a demonstration was going on. Me, pikachu, Andrew, and Ian went to check it out. We got there just as the demo started.
"This is the latest achievement from Silph! It will astound you! It will amaze you." A man in a suit was saying this while standing in front of a large object that was covered by a blanket.
"Sounds like a circus attraction." I whispered to Ian and Andrew. They chuckled.
"Behold!" The man pulled the blanket off the object. It looked like four chairs with helmets attached to them. "The virtual pokemon world two thousand!"
The crowd around us began to ooh and ah.
"Looks like something straight out of a horror movie." I whispered to Andrew and Ian. They chuckled again.
"Can I get some volunteers?" The man asked the crowd. "Some pokemon trainers, preferably."
Pikachu, Andrew and I raised our hands. Ian stayed quiet.
"Ahh. Yes you'll do." The man said. We stepped up to the platform. "Just sit here and... hey your pokemon wants to do this too?" He asked.
"Yeah. Why not?" I said. The man strapped some cloth over us and plugged in some connectors and fired up the machine.
"Put your pokeballs in those slots there." The man pointed to some holes next to the chairs. "And be sure to put some empty ones in there too."
Andrew placed his team and a few empties in the slots while I loaded mine with ivysaur, wartortle, gengar, and a few empties. The man pulled the visors down over our eyes.
"You're going to lose consciousness for a while. But don't worry, you'll wake up in a moment." The man said.
I blacked out. In a moment I woke up and found myself standing in a large field. Pikachu materialized next to me and Andrew appeared next to pikachu. Everything seemed normal. Just then a large screen materialized in front of us. The man appeared in the screen.
"Welcome to the virtual pokemon world!" He said.
"We're in the computer?" I asked.
"Yes. This world is totally virtual. You can even catch pokemon with your empty pokeballs." The man said.
I checked my belt and I found my pokeballs. I then noticed that everything was digital. I looked down at pikachu and saw that he too was digital. He looked pretty funny pixelized. So did Andrew.
"What kind of pokemon live in a virtual world?" Andrew asked.
"Why porygon of course!" The man said. "Oh yeah, this virtual world has a built in pokedex."
We walked around for a little while when we saw something strange. A section of a wall was moving up and down. Pikachu noticed it too and let loose with an electric attack. A camouflaged pokemon jumped out with a cry. I reached for dexter but my pockets were empty. I looked around and the screen had a pokedex button on it. I pushed the button and the dexter appeared in my hand. I pointed it at the pokemon.
"Porygon. The virtual pokemon. A pokemon that consists entirely of programming code. Capable of moving freely in cyberspace." Dexter said.
"Feel free to catch a porygon." The man said.
"Ransee!" The porygon said.
"Hey. It doesn't even say its name right!" I said.
"That's because porygon was programmed in another country and its language wasn't changed over to english." The man said.
Pikachu went to challenge the porygon.
"Ah. No need for that. Just capture it." The man said.
I tossed an empty pokeball at the porygon. The ball made contact and the porygon was drawn inside. The button turned red. The ball fell to the ground and shook for a moment. The ball lay still and the button turned gray. I picked up the pokeball.
"Yeah! I caught a porygon!" I said.
Just then the screen turned to fuzz. Then a large red letter R appeared on the screen.
"Hahahaha! We've got you now kid!" Kirby's voice came from the screen. Then Lilly and Kirby appeared on the screen.
"Prepare for trouble!" Lilly said.
"And make it double!" Kirby said.
"To protect the world from devastation!"
"To unite all peoples within our nation!"
"To denounce the evils of truth and love!"
"To extend our reach to the stars above!"
"Lilly!"
"Kirby!"
"Team Rocket! Blast off at the speed of light!"
"Surrender now or prepare to fight!" They both said.
"Too bad you can't interrupt us this time kid! Huh?" Kirby looked around but we were not to be seen. Andrew, pikachu, and I had taken refuge in some nearby digital bushes.
"So what do we do. We're locked in the system!" Andrew said.
"I know, I know! Just give me a minute to think." I said. But then the screen found us. We took off. We ran through the bushes and through a digital forest. Then we hit an invisible wall.
"Ow! What the?" Andrew asked.
"Looks like this is the extent of the virtual world." I said.
"Of course. It's only a demo." Andrew said.
"Pikachu." Pikachu was rubbing his head.
"You can't hide forever!" Lilly screamed.
"She's right. There's only so many hiding places here." I said.
"Hey! Think porygon can help?" Andrew asked.
"Good idea." I said. I let porygon out of the pokeball.
"Ransee!" Porygon said.
"I'll never get used to that." I said. "Porygon. We've lost the connection to Cinnabar. We need you to make one."
"Ransee!" Porygon nodded its head. Porygon began to glow and a screen appeared in front of me. All I saw was a command prompt.
"Dang! The system was shut down!" I said. "I'll need to get the system started up again. Porygon I need a keyboard."
"Ransee!" Porygon nodded and glowed again. A keyboard appeared in front of me. I quickly began to start typing.
"Andrew. Go distract team rocket until I can get the system back up." I said. "Pikachu, you help too. Andrew, don't let anything happen to pikachu."
Andrew took off with pikachu hot on his heels.
"Okay, lets see what this system is made of." I said as I was typing.
Andrew and pikachu ran towards team rocket. Soon they were
spotted.
"Piiiikachu!" Pikachu let loose with an electric attack.
"Graveler go!" Andrew said.
A voltorb and a beedrill appeared.
"Man! Since when were they part of the program?" Andrew asked.
"VOLTORB!" The volt orb said as it launched itself at geodude. The beedrill tried to tackle pikachu but pikachu easily dodged.
I was typing furiously at the keyboard.
"Man what a primitive operating system!" I said.
"Ransee!" Porygon said in agreement.
"Ok, lets try this command and... well... dang security protocols... lets turn that off, edit this... almost there." I said while typing. "Just a little longer Andrew."
The beedrill launched into a pin missile attack. Pikachu got
bombarded by needles. Pikachu let loose with an electric blast.
Graveler tackled the voltorb. The voltorb returned the tackle.
Graveler then dug his hands into the ground and lifted up a large
rock and hummed it at the voltorb. The attack hit home and the
voltorb was sent flying at the beedrill. Pikachu let loose with
another electric blast that sent the beedrill and voltorb flying
straight at the screen.
"Bingo!" I said as the system came to life. The welcome
screen came on and then porygon dived into the screen. In a few
moments porygon reappeared and the man came on the screen.
"What happened?" He asked.
"Team rocket hacked your system. I had to hack it just to get it back up." I said. "Lucky I took all those computer courses in school."
Andrew and pikachu came back.
"Team rocket disappeared." Andrew said. Pikachu jumped up on me and sat on my head.
"We're pulling you guys out in a second." The man said.
I called porygon back into the pokeball. I blacked out again. When I woke up I was back in the chair with that strange helmet on my head. The man helped us out of the chairs.
"Uh... heh heh, I guess it still has a few bugs in it." The man apologized.
"It's okay. We know how to handle team rocket." I said.
"Pikachu." Pikachu nodded in agreement.
We collected our pokeballs and left the lab. For rest of the time we were content to just sit on the shore and fish for awhile. We were pretty sure that team rocket couldn't bother us there. When the ship came we were let on board, complements of Prof. Blaine. The ship sailed for two days. We laid around like lazy bums the whole trip. Even pikachu was enjoying the peace. When we arrived in Pallet's port we wasted no time and headed to Prof. Oak's lab. We told him about our recent adventures and our many battles. He was glad to hear how well we were doing. He let us stay the night. The next morning we headed out to Viridian city. Once the path forked in two, I decided that the best course of action would be to take the road we didn't take the first time around. We walked down the path. We met many trainers on the road. Every single one of them was just starting out. We didn't waste our time on them. We just flashed our seven badges and they didn't bother us. We reached Viridian city just after nightfall. We decided that we would check the gym in the morning. Alexia had left me another note at the pokecenter. She warned me that the Viridian gym was run by team rocket. I told this to the guys.
"So I guess we don't get the last badge huh?" Andrew asked.
"Why not?" Ian asked.
"We're no exactly on the top of team rockets good list." I said.
"It can't be that bad." Ian said.
"Trey beat the heck out of one of them. Really messed the guy up too." Andrew said.
"Pikachu." Pikachu said in agreement.
"They can't deny us a badge battle. No matter how many rules they break, they can't break that one!" I said.
Andrew and Ian offered no argument. We went to bed early that night. We wanted to be ready for anything in the morning. Before I fell asleep, I came up with a plan that could help me out if the need arises.
"Yeah. All the Nurse Joy's are pokemon league officials. If team rocket does deny us a battle, all we gotta do is ask Nurse Joy to intervene." I said to myself. Andrew and Ian were fast asleep and so was pikachu. Soon, I too nodded off.